Thread by @kamilkazani

Daily reminder that as a rule Western Academia has great contempt towards public imagination of non-Western countries. They misrepresent their internal debates ignoring whatever doesn’t fit to their preconceptions

Galkovsky is wildly more impactful than Dugin for example

https://twitter.com/kamilkazani/status/1533133993981272066

Galkovsky has been the most influential Russian nationalist thinker of the recent decades and Sputnik and Pogrom - the most influential media. They largely shaped the worldview of young Russian nationalists

Meanwhile they’re almost totally ignored by most “Russia experts”

Why? Well, for the same reason they love Dugin. Once they established Russia is so Mystic and Irrational, they’ll look for whatever fits into their preconceptions and ignore the rest

Every Russian with half a brain knows how to use it for their own advantage

Real Russia has nothing to do with their Orientalist phantasies. It’s super rational, shockingly rational culture. If it fails badly, it’s not because it doesn’t calculate but because calculation was bad. Two very different things

And of course Russia doesn’t fall for mysticism anywhere as easy as they would like you to believe. What Russia falls for easily and enthusiastically is not mysticism but pseudoscience

Life advice

If you are a non-Westerner desiring a fruitful collaboration with Anglo media/academia:

1. Listen to them for 15 min
2. Identify their key preconceptions
3. Confirm them all

Never ever contradict or add nuances. Just confirm. That makes you a reliable source